Americans Live Within Their Means & Other Wingnut Fantasies

Of all the tired, old bromides which have worked their way into our discourse, the old “American families have to live within a budget, and so should the federal government” meme is one of the most annoying. It's annoying because it's so easily debunked; the very people spouting this bullshit are the ones riding mountains of credit card debt, for crying out loud!

I’ve written about this before but my first response is always: No! No we don’t! Since when? American consumer debt, which doesn’t include mortgages, is $2.43 trillion as of March 2011. Total U.S. revolving debt, which is almost entirely credit card debt, was $796.1 billion, as of March 2011. In fact, in March U.S. credit card debt increased for the second time since 2008, which the Wall Street Journal presented as a good thing:

U.S. consumers in March increased their credit-card debt for the second time since the financial crisis flared, giving a sign of hope that consumer spending could boost an economic recovery that has lost some steam.

In its monthly report Friday on borrowing, the Federal Reserve also said overall consumer credit outstanding rose, up $6.02 billion to $2.426 trillion. The increase, the sixth in a row, was bigger than expected. Economists surveyed by Dow Jones Newswires had forecast a $4.8-billion rise in consumer debt during March.

I’m not going to say whether this is bad or good, I’m just saying it completely debunks the ol’ “American families have to live within their means and so should the government” meme. No, we don’t! We never have! We have always been a country of consumers who satisfy their every need and whim with the swipe of plastic. We have well over a million people who declare bankruptcy every year. And our economy depends on this debt! Imagine if Americans did live within their means, paying cash as they go, never borrowing. Our entire economy would implode!

It just annoys me that no one ever calls the pundits and politicians on this shit when it’s so obviously wrong. So thank goodness Jared Bernstein writes about it on his new blog. Bernstein was Chief Economist and Economic Adviser to Vice President Joe Biden and a member of President Obama’s economic team before leaving the White House to become a senior fellow at the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities.

He writes:

But there’s another fundamental way in which this family budget analogy gets misused.  Families borrow to make investments and to get over rough patches.  They run deficits too.  I went into pretty deep debt to finance college and grad school and I’m glad I did.

The whole credit system is based on the fact that if we had to pay cash-as-we-go for everything, we’d seriously underinvest.  And that’s true for families and governments—and yes, you can overdo the borrowing thing.  But to flip too far the other way is equally dangerous.

So, while it sounds good and has some merit, I’d use the “gov’t budget=family budget” argument with care and I’d discount those who want to use it as a hammer to insist on instant cuts.

American families borrow money to buy houses and cars and invest in their businesses. They run up credit card debt and take out loans to pay for college. Families default on their loans all the time. We don’t live within our means any more than anyone else does. So can we please retire this stupid analogy once and for all? I mean it's ridiculous, I hear people repeating it whom I know to have declared personal bankruptcy or have had their cars repo'd. It's like people don't even engage their brains before opening their mouths to repeat these tired old pieces of supposed conventional wisdom. Have they all been brainwashed?

I’ll Take Things It Shouldn’t Take 30 Years To Do, Alex

Waaaaay back in 1990 a law was passed that required the Dept. of Defense to get its books in order so we can do a full financial audit, and yet even though their deadline isn’t until 2017 it seems they won’t be making that deadline. That would be 27 years to do a financial audit of the Pentagon.

And they can’t do it.

Whew. Okie dokie, well thank goodness we have a bipartisan group of Senators who have a little problem with that :

“Based on the findings of today’s FIAR Plan, it appears unlikely that the Department of Defense will be able to meet that 2017 requirement,” they said in the statement, obtained by POLITICO.

“Today’s report by the DOD’s comptroller shows that while a few small agencies within the department have reached the required financial audit level, the vast majority of the department had not,” the statement said.

“Further, while the report shows that DOD has a fairly complete road-map of how the Army, Navy, Air Force and other defense agencies will each reach the auditability requirement by 2017, implementation of these goals faces major challenges.”

Past GAO reports have found a high risk for waste, fraud, abuse and mismanagement at the Pentagon. The senators want their new GAO report in time for a hearing on the subject in July.

Okay I get that the Pentagon is huge and might need a little more time to get itself audit-ready than, say, your typical ice cream stand. But 27 years? Areyoukiddingme?

But don’t worry!

In the progress report submitted Monday, Defense Department comptroller Robert F. Hale said audit readiness has been a goal for many years but has been difficult to achieve because of the department’s size and complexity.

Hale said American taxpayers should understand that “although the department does not yet meet commercial audit standards, their tax dollars are being managed responsibly.”

Ha ha ha! Nothing to see here, move along! Don’t worry, be happy! Government should operate like a business! Blargeddy blargh!

For example, by all means do not investigate Darpa:

The Project on Government Oversight (POGO) asked for the inquiry after news reports that Darpa handed out $1.75 million in contracts to a company owned in part by agency director Regina Dugan and her relatives. What’s more, Dugan is owed $250,000 by her family firm, RedXDefense. POGO wants to verify that Dugan had nothing to do with the contracts, and to determine if “any Darpa employee” dealing with the company knew of its connections to the woman at the top.

In a letter to the Pentagon inspector general written on Monday, Danielle Brian, POGO’s executive director, calls for an investigation that goes beyond Dugan, who recused herself from any dealings with RedXDefense upon becoming director.

Brian cites recent comments from Kaigham “Ken” Gabriel, Dugan’s deputy, calling financial conflicts “prevalent” at the agency, since Darpa’s highly technical work requires it to recruit talent from many of the firms and researchers who bid on its contracts.

“We urge the DoD IG to immediately pursue an audit to ensure that Darpa selects and awards grants and contracts with integrity,” Brian writes in the letter to Inspector General Gordon S. Heddell. Perhaps “more  stringent measures” are needed to prevent potential conflicts of interest.

POGO also questions just how closely the Pentagon oversees Darpa. The Pentagon inspector general’s office hasn’t audited the agency’s contracting methods since 1997.

I realize $1.75 million is small potatoes but it's also the tip of the iceberg. The point is: fraud and waste are endemic throughout the Pentagon, not just in things like $700 toilet seats and building fighter jet engines the Pentagon doesn't even want but some Senator needs the factory to stay open or they'll face a tough reelection campaign.

No, this is the kind of shit that goes on under our noses while everyone has hissy fits over the "Muslim Brotherhood" donating to NPR. I wonder if any Breitbart acolytes have considered dressing up as pimped-out Raytheon execs seeking research money to finish work on their invisibility cloak and time travel machine? Of course not! Because in right-wing land, every penny spent on the Pentagon is honorable. There’s never any such thing as “government waste” when the Dept. of Defense does it.

With that in mind, this bit from the Politico article amused me:

Meanwhile, Republicans in Congress are divided between those who want to include deep defense cuts in any debt reduction plan and those concerned about the impact of such cuts on national security.

That’s hilarious. Yeah, you know, when your country spends at least five times more on defense than any other nation in the world, I’d say you’ve got nothing to worry about.

I really find it hard to believe that any Republican doesn’t think there’s waste and corruption at the Dept. of Defense. There’s a vast river of tax money flowing through the Pentagon, and you can bet your sweet bippy there are greedy, corrupt assholes trying to get their hands on it. But since the Pentagon still isn’t audit-ready after 27 years, I guess we’ll never know.

Instead, let's talk about how the budget deficit is forcing us to kill Medicare and Social Security.

A Funny Definition Of Victory, Part 2

The last time the government shut down, the time Newt Gingrich did it, I actually worked for the federal government at a national recreation area. That was interesting, to say the least.

Government shutdowns suck on a lot of levels, though one thing they do accomplish is make people aware of all the things our government does, things which should be obvious but which people are ridiculously oblivious to nonetheless. I’m thinking of the lady I saw on the news who was shocked to discover that the national Civil War battlefield she planned to visit today would be closed if a deal couldn’t be reached.

I mean, duh. But that attitude is extremely common. I remember way back when telling my dad I was off work and he's like "Why?" And I'm like, "The government shut down, you know ..." and he kept saying, "you're affected by that? Really? YOU? I had no idea!"

Le sigh. So, government shutdowns can be a teachable moment for a lot of mainstream Americans who take government for granted.

That said, I was not like Mike Pence leading the Teanutties in a chant of “Shut it down!” No, as I said, government shutdowns suck on a lot of levels, trust me, I know. They are a failure of our politics and a failure of democracy. If our government is forced to shut down over something like a budget impasse, it does not speak very highly of our system or our leaders.

So I’m glad we have a reprieve. But for crying out loud, please let’s not call this last-minute deal a victory. This is a tragedy, and it should be stated as such. Because I’m sorry, I just don’t see these things as wins:

1) $17 BILLION IN CHIMPS -- WE SPREAD OUT THE CUTS ACROSS OTHER PARTS OF THE BUDGET. We insisted that meeting in the middle on cuts would require looking beyond domestic discretionary spending—and we prevailed. More than half—or $17 billion—of the final round of spending cuts came from changes in mandatory programs, or CHIMPs. The emphasis on this part of the budget staved off severe cuts to key domestic programs like education, clean energy, and medical research.

2.) $3B IN PENTAGON SAVINGS -- WE PROVED DoD WASTE SHOULD NOT BE SPARED. We won the argument that waste at the Pentagon should not be immune from spending cuts. The final agreement eliminates nearly $3 billion in unnecessary Pentagon spending that was contained in H.R. 1. These reductions are supported by Secretary Gates.

3) TITLE X PRESERVED -- WE FOUGHT OFF ATTACKS ON WOMEN’S HEALTH. We fended off their highest priority among the riders by nixing their proposal to gut Title X funds that provide cancer screenings and other preventative health services for women. The Republicans’ overreach on this rider in the final days dramatically weakened their hand.

Yes, well, my uterus thanks you. But I’m sorry ... $3 billion in Pentagon waste while cutting $17 billion in Social Security and Medicare spending? That’s, what, basically that one redundant fighter jet engine that was already axed? I mean, really? That’s all the waste you can find at the Pentagon? Are they still giving $50 million to NASCAR? Just wondering.

I bring this up because last week David Sirota noted that the one-week continuing resolution would set our bloated Pentagon budget for the year, while leaving the rest of the budget open to negotiation. This means the burden of all that deficit-reducing everyone is yammering about will be borne by social programs. Or, as Sirota wrote:

....an even larger and more disproportionate amount of budget cuts will be focused almost exclusively on the relatively small portion of the discretionary budget that funds social programs.

Because there’s always money for war.

This is how Democrats cut deals with Republicans, and even worse they are trying to sell this to us as a win. And don’t give me that crap about fighting for women’s health when the deal that was struck banned locally-funded abortions in D.C. I guess some uteruses are more equal than others.

No, nothing pisses me off more than when Democrats try to sell me a shit sandwich. This happened last summer when the FMAP extension was passed by cutting food stamp benefits.

This shit happens all the time. The Claims Resolution Act of 2010 -- the settlement to 75,000 black farmers discriminated again in the case known as Pigford II -- was paid for in part with cuts to WIC funding.

Democrats need to realize that robbing Peter to pay Paul is not a “win” for liberals. And some of us actually are paying attention to this stuff.

So am I glad the government has not shut down (yet)? Hell yeah. But am I pissed the Pentagon budget got trimmed by a measley $3 billion and is now off-limits? You betcha.

When polls show Americans a) vastly underestimate how much we spend on defense, and b) support cutting the defense budget anyway, one has to wonder what the hell the Democrats in Washington are thinking. Maybe they’re too scared of looking “weak on defense” and like “cheese eating surrender monkeys” and like they “don’t support the troops” and all the other mean stuff the right will say about them. But guess what: they say that shit anyway!

So I guess we’ll just keep on being asked to accept winning these small battles while losing war after war, over and over again, until the end of time. I guess we’re supposed to be happy with that.

I dunno, doesn’t sound like a win to me.

Religious Leaders Fast In Protest Of Congress' Immoral Budget

The irony of American religious leaders protesting a Republican budget with a hunger strike is tremendous. I mean gosh, our national news media keeps telling us that all Christians are conservative, small-government, free-market Republicans! This certainly puts a kink in that CW, does it not?

Earlier this morning, religious leaders and anti-poverty advocates announced that they will begin fasting to protest budget cuts that they argue "balance the budget on the backs of poor people." Progressive evangelical leader Jim Wallis and David Beckmann, president of Bread for the World, joined former Democratic congressman Tony Hall in calling on others to join them in the fast and on Congress to restore funding for hunger programs and other anti-poverty initiatives.

[...]

Religious organizations from the National Association of Evangelicals to the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops have criticized proposed federal budgets to means-tested programs as immoral and unjust. And Wallis, Beckmann, and Hall are attracting support for their fast from an array of partners, including the Jewish Council for Public Affairs, Islamic Relief USA, and Meals on Wheels. They haven't yet decided how long they'll continue the fast, but Wallis issued an additional challenge to members of Congress who support cuts in anti-poverty programs: be honest. "I want to hear just one of them say out loud that every line item of military spending is more important to the well-being of the country than child nutrition, than child health and vaccinations. They've crossed a line, but they want to keep pretending this is all about fiscal responsibility."

Good for them. You can read Tony Hall's powerful message "Why I Am Fasting (Again)" here.

I hate to be so cynical but I don’t look for the national news media to carry this story any further than a blog post. Jim Wallis and other social justice Christians have protested, been arrested over the Iraq War, and arrested over the 2006 budget, which raised nary an eyebrow from the national media. Who remembers this:

115 religious leaders were arrested in front of the Cannon House Office Building while kneeling in prayer to protest the immoral budget and tax agenda which slashes spending on the poor to finance tax breaks for the rich. Led by Jim Wallis of Call to Renewal, national faith leaders, clergy and faith-based providers of services to the poor held a press conference.

We never hear about this stuff, but some redneck with 10 followers in Bumfug, Tennessee wants to burn a Koran and it’s all the media can talk about.

Anyway, I’m posting this information for a couple of reasons. 1) Not all Christians are right-wing, intolerant assholes and 2) Budgets are moral documents which tell the world your priorities. Where your treasure is, so is your heart. And if your treasure is devoted to war, and torture, and bombs, instead of feeding poor children and funding schools and the rest, then you’re in deep trouble as a nation. You're failing your people. And when no one in power stands up and says "enough, this will not stand," then you no longer have the moral authority to tell anyone else in the world how to behave.

Bob Herbert penned his final column for the New York Times on Saturday, and it brought tears to my eyes. He wrote:

The U.S. has not just misplaced its priorities. When the most powerful country ever to inhabit the earth finds it so easy to plunge into the horror of warfare but almost impossible to find adequate work for its people or to properly educate its young, it has lost its way entirely.

Nearly 14 million Americans are jobless and the outlook for many of them is grim. Since there is just one job available for every five individuals looking for work, four of the five are out of luck. Instead of a land of opportunity, the U.S. is increasingly becoming a place of limited expectations. A college professor in Washington told me this week that graduates from his program were finding jobs, but they were not making very much money, certainly not enough to think about raising a family.

There is plenty of economic activity in the U.S., and plenty of wealth. But like greedy children, the folks at the top are seizing virtually all the marbles. Income and wealth inequality in the U.S. have reached stages that would make the third world blush. As the Economic Policy Institute has reported, the richest 10 percent of Americans received an unconscionable 100 percent of the average income growth in the years 2000 to 2007, the most recent extended period of economic expansion.

Yes that was the “Bush boom,” which was a big, fat bust for most people. This is Republican America, where the haves feel they’re entitled to their looted wealth, and the rest of us are told to stop whining.

It’s enough to make some folks lose their appetite.

Young Vs. Old

[UPDATE]:

More from E.J. Dionne...

The federal government could also help the states by picking up more of their Medicaid costs. In the long run, health care spending should be a responsibility of the national government — as it is in almost every other wealthy democracy. A national commitment would end the specter of states forcing already financially beleaguered citizens off the health insurance rolls.

Such ideas are off the table because the current rage is not for figuring out how to make government work better — a cause that once united governors of both parties — but for cutting back even its most basic and popular functions.

This country is going down the tubes fast, from the national to the state to the local level. Our problems are too many in number and our institutions have failed us. Where this ride ends I don't know, but it isn't looking good.

------------------------

Things are about to get really busy for me (indeed they already have) and I’m going to have to step away from the blog for a short while as I take care of some other stuff. So in the meantime I’m posting Bill Gates’ TED Talk on state budgets. It’s short: around 10 minutes. Give it a look.

It’s certainly not the best TED Talk I’ve ever watched, but it was intended to be a conversation starter. And it’s interesting to me that this was taped before the whole uproar in Wisconsin started. But his framing of the state budget “crises” as a “young-vs-old” thing resonated. States are deinvesting from the young by cutting education to pay for the old and meet pension obligations and deal with rising healthcare costs. Well, it's old people who vote so, big shocker there.

Of course in practice, what we’re starting to see in places like Wisconsin is cutting from the young and the old so rich assholes like the Koch Brothers can increase their profits -- which somehow never manage to trickle down on the rest of us. That’s not just immoral, it’s insane. I’d love to hear what Bill Gates has to say about Scott Walker.

The other points he makes are that really we are paying for our inability to deal with our massive healthcare issue. He doesn’t phrase it that way but that is it in a nutshell. Plenty of smarter folks have said this before but let’s just put it bluntly: it’s the healthcare costs, stupid. Failure to address rising healthcare costs have put us in a budget pickle, and industry-friendly Republicans and Democrats showed themselves to be fiscal frauds when they put up roadblocks to every single idea and initiative that would control costs. Way to go, idiots. And our glorious mainstream media, which profits handsomely off the megamillions spent advertising prescription drugs nobody needs, did absolutely nothing to educate the public about this issue. (And by the way, media watchdogs: can the U.S. get one of these? Sure would have come in handy during the healthcare debate.)

So yes, our state and federal budget issues are really healthcare issues, which Gates mentions. And finally, people do need to become more educated about what’s happening with their state budgets. Sadly, we can no longer rely upon the news media to adequately inform us. The mainstream media has, as was pointed out recently, “become journalistically irrelevant when it comes to national issues and coverage." Unfortunately, as my local newspaper’s eagerness to publish corporate propaganda demonstrates, local media isn’t much better. So we need to find a better way of communicating the facts without letting the special interest groups do their spin job.

So without further ado, Bill Gates: How state budgets are breaking US schools.

There Are Two Sides To Every Budget

I dunno, but our discourse in this country is really just too stupid. I just never understood why when we’re discussing things like budgets, government spending and tax cuts we always address these as separate things. I’m no math whiz but last time I checked, budgets are made of two things: spending AND revenue. Yet our national debate has somehow separated these things as if they are completely unrelated issues.

I just finished hearing an interview on Good Morning America with Mike Huckabee where he goes on and on about how the government is broke, state governments are broke, and we have to live within our means. We all have to tighten our belts. Right. Raising revenue wasn't even mentioned.

And then I read this rundown of Wisconsin lawmakers’ views on Gov. Walker’s controversial budget bill. Most Republicans seem to be supporting Walker despite the thousands of protestors because, hey, the state is broke:

"We have a financial crisis facing the state of $137 million in cuts that's needed to balance the budget by June 30 as we are required to do by the state's constitution and an expected deficit in the 2011-13 budget of upward of $3.5 billion in a budget that hasn't even begun," Lazich said.

And:

"I think the bill was done to cause the least amount of pain," Wynn said. "The state is broke. It's the best way to prevent a lot more tragedy."

And finally, we have Gov. Scott Walker himself, refusing to budge on the collective bargaining issue, despite wage and benefits concessions the unions have agreed to, because, he says

I want to give those local governments the tools they need to balance the budget now and in the future. They can't do that with the current collective bargaining laws in the state.

Walker has failed to adequately explain how collective bargaining prevents local governments from negotiating, or why collective bargaining is fine for some groups (police, firemen) but it’s a budget-buster for others (teachers). Oh well, we’ll just have to take that one on faith since no one in the media seems interested in asking that question either.

But no one asks about raising revenue, either. Gov. Walker signed a bill eliminating corporate taxes back in January; well, if he’s so worried about future budgets (since the unions have made concessions addressing the current one), then why did he cut revenue? Why, when we’re trying to balance budgets, is it always done on one side of the ledger sheet? You can’t cut revenue and then all of a sudden go “oh my GOD we have no money how did THAT happen?!”

I mean, I thought the whole conservative ideology was that tax cuts were stimulative. Apparently they aren’t, since we’ve been cutting taxes on people and corporations for years now and the result appears to be a fiscal crisis from the federal level on down to local governments. Guess this just proves you guys have been wrong all these years, then.

And if Walker's tax cuts are supposed to be so wonderful for the economy, then I'm sure local governments won't need to worry about ditching collective bargaining for certain groups of workers because the money will just be flooding in to government coffers.

No? Well why the hell not? Why did you cut all those taxes, then? And maybe y'all ought not have done that? Ya think?

Of course, we never draw these conclusions because we always address spending and revenue as completely separate issues when they are quite obviously part of the same conversation. I just have to wonder how the hell that happened.

We just went through a few weeks of yammering about extending the Bush tax cuts which affect the wealthiest individuals in America; now suddenly we are yammering about a national budget crisis. We have people like Mike Huckabee and Sarah Palin and other conservatives talking about the need for Americans to sacrifice. Clearly, since they just supported tax cuts to the wealthy, they mean other people need to sacrifice -- not the millionaires and billionaires, the ones who can most afford it. They mean the people already living with tight belts. That's just immoral.

I mean, I’m just waiting for Diane Sawyer or Katie Couric or someone to ask Walker (or any legislator) this question: “You cut taxes and now you complain the government is broke. Did you flunk math in school?” Forget raising taxes, how about just leaving them where they are for a while?

But no one asks these questions because we always treat these two issues as if they weren’t connected. And it’s such an obvious failure on the part of the national narrative that I have to think it’s intentional. With that in mind, I direct readers to Amy Dean’s Huffington Post column today. She writes:

While the particulars of each individual battle are important, in the end this is not about one state. It is about confronting the disturbing tendency among our lawmakers to seek scapegoats rather than real solutions to our nation's most central problems.

Yes, I think that’s the nib of the nub. As long as no one slaps their forehead and says, “wow maybe we shouldn’t have tax cuts at a time when our budgets are already strapped and we’re killing sacred cows like education,” it’s so much easier to scapegoat middle class public employees and sell the idea that eliminating their rights will solve everything.

I mean, seriously. There are two issues at work here. Why are we only talking about one of them?

Budgets Are Moral Documents

Yes we hear that all the time. But what does it mean? It means, it’s the true reflection of your priorities. You can talk a good game all you want, but the proof is in the budget. How you spend your money speaks volumes about your character. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.

So I wonder what it says about the Republicans and their new-found austerity that they are refusing to cut taxpayer funds to NASCAR? Minnesota Democrat Betty McCollum proposed axing the $7 million the Defense Department spends on sponsoring a car, as well as the $45 million tax earmark that was part of the newly-extended Bush tax cuts. Her bill did not pass.

For the record, most reports I’ve read omitted the tax earmark info, and only mentioned the $7 million in actual car sponsorship. Turns out it’s actually more like $52 million that taxpayers spend on NASCAR. That’s still insignificant when compared to our budget and the budget deficit, but the GOP’s default position has been “we all have to make sacrifices” and, “you have to start somewhere,” yada yada. So rather than quibble over an approach which Gail Collins rightly likened to “planning to lose 50 pounds by reducing your intake of kale,” let’s concede that point, just for the sake of argument.

Let’s just look at some programs the Republicans have cut from the budget so we can give taxpayer money to NASCAR:

• Maternal & Child Health Block Grant -- $50 million
• High School Graduation Initiative -- $50 million
• Child Care Development Block Grant – $39 million
• Green Jobs Innovation Fund -- $40 million

None of this even compares to the billions of dollars in worthy programs the GOP has on the chopping block -- Pell Grants, home heating assistance, Head Start, help for the elderly, environmental protection, food safety, etc. Or, for that matter, the money for war and tax breaks for insanely profitable oil companies the Republicans have kept. We all know the Republicans are being penny wise and pound foolish with these budget proposals. That’s not what this post is about.

This post is about looking at one thing, and seeing it as a window on the Republican soul. Money for NASCAR, but not to retrain workers for green jobs. Money for NASCAR but not prenatal care for poor pregnant women. $50 million for NASCAR but not to improve graduation rates at our schools.

Republicans are the ones who said this about cutting funds for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting:

“We've got to keep our priorities straight," said Representative Ralph Regula, an Ohio Republican who is chairman of the appropriations panel that approved the cut. “You're going to choose between giving a little more money to handicapped children versus providing appropriations for public broadcasting."

And this about the cuts in general:

Rep. Hal Rogers, R-Ky., the chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, said in a statement:

Lawmakers "have weeded out excessive, unnecessary, and wasteful spending, making tough choices to prioritize programs based on their effectiveness and benefit to the American people. My committee has taken a thoughtful look at each and every one of the programs we intend to cut, and have made determinations based on this careful analysis."

I’m going to call bullshit on your sanctimonious ass and tell you that quite a few of the programs you're cutting are waaaay more beneficial to the American people than NASCAR. So no I don't need a lecture on priorities from a group of people whose only priority is rewarding their political friends.

Oh, and as to the argument that NASCAR sponsorship is a military recruiting tool, the New York Times had this to say today

the Navy and the Marines Corps have pulled out of the Nascar sponsorship business — precisely because they could not gauge the effectiveness of their campaigns on recruiting.

It’s almost funny to me that Republicans want to spend money on NASCAR, which is a dying sport. But it’s their dying sport, and by God they’re going to hang onto it with all they’ve got. Democrats want to spend money on prenatal care for poor pregnant women, job training, education, and the like. Republicans want to throw money at a dying sport which is the last refuge of their aging, dying base. That's worse than sad, it's pathetic.

So, these are the fiscal phonies you voted for, America (or rather, didn't vote for when you were too busy or disillusioned or not-paying-enough-attention or whatever the fuck reason you gave for not showing up to vote last November, which is how these idiots took charge of the House to begin with. Republicans didn't win, Democrats gave it away. But I digress.)

And here we have a perfect example of what is meant when people say budgets are moral documents. This is, indeed, a clear window onto the Republican soul. These are their priorities. This money isn't coming back when we're flush again: it's gone for good. This is the Republican Agenda, in black and white: cut aid to poor women and children, cut education and healthcare, cut consumer protections. Keep our fanboy projects and our wars and giveaways to outrageously wealthy corporations.

Budgets are moral documents. This one says it all.

Memory Hole: Deficit Edition

While some lefty bloggers have noticed similarities between our punditry’s embrace of the Iraq invasion and the media’s current blind belief in right-wing “ZOMG the deficit is gonna kill us allll!” messaging, I’m taking a far less nuanced approach.

As the 2012 budget forces us all to go ‘round the hamster wheel for another insufferable bullshit national debate, I’d like to remind people of one thing: deficits don’t matter.

That wasn’t just Dick Cheney’s wishful thinking when trying to shove tax cuts for the uber-wealthy down our throats in the middle of wartime, that was a Weekly Standard column by none other than the august Irwin Seltzer, of the conservative Hudson Institute (Hudson is one of those places that preaches the glories of the free market and individual responsibility):

Which brings us to the economic level. The deficits that Bush ran up in the years in which the country was teetering on the verge of a serious recession had the beneficial effect of righting the economy. In that sense, deficits not only didn't matter, but were a force for economic good.

Yes, kids, once upon a time conservative thinkers actually believed that deficits not only didn’t matter, but that they were a “force for economic good.” Go on and read his column: his whole argument is that operating a deficit to right an economy in the recessionary doldrums is not just good, but essential (cue maniacal Dr. Strangelove grin).

Call me a cynic, but I have a feeling deficits really only matter based on which political party is having fun with the Chinese credit card. Maybe it's just me. But I can't help but laugh at the Republican hypocrites now calling for the fainting couches because Democrats--gasp!--want to cut the Pentagon's NASCAR sponsorship! This just proves what haters they are!

It is also a clear indication that Democrats think that the NASCAR voting bloc is not voting with them now or anytime in the future.

Yeah, I think when you start going down that road, you've conceded the argument. I mean gosh, it's not like PBS viewers are staunch Republicans, right? Isn't that what you're saying? That Obama's budget cuts are politically motivated? Thanks for playing.

We so easily forget our country’s history of just two months ago, when tax cuts for the wealthy were extended, let alone eight years ago, when the Bush Administration enacted the country’s first-ever tax cuts during wartime. For over 200 years we had paid for our wars, but Bush took the unprecedented approach that war could be paid for by future generations. Let that one sink in.

Conservatives cheered both moves, talking about how these things would stimulate the economy and ignoring all evidence to the contrary. Our media for the most part has acted blithely unaware of the hypocrisy at play beneath their noses. And what this should tell everyone, including our glorious media lapdogs who eat up every nugget of Republican messaging like it's filet mignon, is that these people are dishonest brokers. They really don’t give a shit about the national deficit, they just want their failed policies of tax cuts and deregulation and they will lie to anyone to see that this happens.

So please get a clue, already. Next time some Republican Congresscritter like John Boehner gets all teary-eyed about how the deficit is ruining this country, please ask them why they cheered the deficit six, seven, eight years ago. Please hold them to account. You just can't keep letting one political party hit the reset button as soon as they come into power, while still holding the Democrats to account for shit that happened 40 years ago.

In the meantime, another blogger points out that our budge debate should really be a healthcare debate, because that is where the money goes.

Ignorance Is Bliss

Yeah, it’s a Rasmussen poll, but still, I have every reason to think it’s an accurate illustration of American ignorance:

Voters Underestimate How Much U.S. Spends on Defense

Voters are fairly evenly divided as to whether the federal government spends too much or too little on national defense, but most also appear to dramatically underestimate how much is actually spent.

The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey shows that 27% of Likely Voters say the United States does not spend enough money on the military and national security. Thirty-two percent (32%) say America spends too much on defense, while a plurality (37%) thinks the nation spends about the right amount. (To see survey question wording, click here.)

But only 25% of voters believe the United States should always spend at least three times as much on defense as any other nation. Forty percent (40%) do not think the country needs to spend this much, while 35% are not sure. Interestingly, if the government were to actually spend only three times as much as any other nation, it would imply a significant cut in U.S. defense spending.

For fiscal year 2011, the total budget for defense is estimated to be around $719 billion. That does not include the cost of veterans’ care, which totals another $124 billion. By comparison, no other nation in the world spends more than $110 billion on defense. Earlier polling showed that just 58% recognize that the United States spends more on defense than any other nation in the world.

Underlying voters’ opinions on how much the United States spends on defense is the fact that many don’t know where most of the government’s money already goes. Just 40% can correctly identify that most federal spending goes towards national defense, Social Security and Medicare. Roughly the same number (38%) believes this statement to be false, while another 22% are not sure.

Considering how much of our national discourse these days is devoted to issues like our budget and budget deficit, you’d think people would know a little something about what we spend our money on.

I think Democrats and progressive groups need to devote a little more time and effort to voter education. Maybe some "The More You Know"-type PSAs or something. I don’t know, it just seems like American ignorance on a variety of topics seems to work in the Republicans’ favor, time and again.

And I have to say: this woeful ignorance of the American electorate depresses me. What the hell, America? How do we make this shit sexy so people get a fucking clue? "Real Housewives of the Congressional Budget Office"?

Fiscal Phonies Revealed

Just repeating what I said yesterday, but when House "Blue Dog" Dems and Republicans approve billions for war on the Chinese credit card, you know damn well that talk about the budget deficit is just propaganda and empty rhetoric:

In the House vote, 148 Democrats and 160 Republicans backed the war spending, but 102 Democrats joined 12 Republicans in opposing the measure. Last year, 32 Democrats opposed a similar midyear spending bill. Among those voting against the bill on Tuesday was Representative David R. Obey, a Wisconsin Democrat and the chairman of the Appropriations Committee, the panel responsible for the measure.

Some of the Democratic opposition stemmed from the decision by party leaders to strip from the bill money that had been included in the original House version to help address the weak economy at home, including funds to help preserve teachers’ jobs. But some of those voting against it said they were influenced by the leaked documents, which highlight the American military’s struggles in Afghanistan and support claims that elements of Pakistan’s intelligence service were helping the Taliban.

And count me among the few voices saying it was right to strip funds for teachers and other projects from this bill. Dammit, liberals, are you really trying to tell me that you think it's okay to hold education and our economic recovery hostage to war spending? Are you kidding me? The argument that we need to fund the war so we can fund teacher pay is the worst sort of immoral bullshit policy debate anyone ever cooked up. No, no, no. You do not "sweeten" war spending. That is appalling.

Here's how they voted. Big shocker that phony local fiscal hawks like Zach Wamp, Marsha Blackburn, Jim Cooper and the rest voted Yes to spend $59 billion on wars while our schools crumble, our infrastructure is in disarray, unemployment remains widespread, state budgets are strapped, etc. etc. I mean, these are the same frauds who said we couldn't afford an extension of unemployment benefits during the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression? Give me a break. You guys are worse than frauds: you're heartless and immoral. You'll pay for war but not food or education? You've lost any credibility where issues like the supposed "deficit crisis" are concerned. You just approved $59 billion that wasn't "budget neutral" to be pissed away in a sandhole on the other side of the world. And for what?

Am I the only one remembering when the healthcare bill had to be "budget neutral"? Why do wars never have to be "budget netural"? We're knocking on the door of 10 years in Afghanistan, people. A decade of war, costing us how many billions of dollars? Is it a trillion? This is, indeed, how empires fall. Study your history, people.

Of Tennessee's delegation, only Memphis Democrat Steve Cohen and Knoxville Republican John Duncan Jr. voted no on this farce. The rest of you guys, every last one of you, are frauds.

Because There’s Always Money For War

I love how everyone talks about cutting federal spending especially on things like healthcare and unemployment benefits, but there’s always money for war:

The House on Thursday voted to keep funding a second engine for the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter, defying the White House and Defense Secretary Robert Gates.

Gates has repeatedly threatened that he would personally recommend that President Barack Obama veto any defense bill containing funding for an engine made by General Electric-Rolls Royce that the Pentagon does not want. The Office of Management and Budget on Thursday followed up with its own veto threat in a statement of administration policy. 


Both GE-Rolls Royce and primary engine maker Pratt & Whitney mounted vigorous lobbying campaigns in recent weeks aligning congressional supporters on each side. But when the House cast a vote on an amendment to strike funding for the second engine, the supporters of a second engine prevailed by a vote of 231-193.

The Pentagon doesn’t want this engine but Congress is going to make sure it gets built anyway. Of course they will. The Penatgon, as Rep. Jim Cooper pointed out a year or so ago, has become a de facto hometown jobs program. Didn’t Eisenhower warn us about this a generation ago?

Never mind. Congress will continue to mouth platitudes about cutting the deficit while refusing to touch the second largest item in the Federal budget:

At over $700 billion this year, total military spending rivals Social Security as the largest item in the federal budget. We are spending more than at any time since World War II, yet our principal enemy has no multi-million person army, no air force, no navy, no sophisticated anti-aircraft systems – in short, none of the kinds of weapons our arsenal is best designed to fight against. And of that $700 billion per year, the vast bulk – over $500 billion – goes towards the Pentagon’s base budget, not the wars in Iraq, Pakistan and Afghanistan. A forthcoming report from the Sustainable Defense Task Force  – a group of defense and budget experts convened with the encouragement of Rep. Barney Frank – presents a menu of options for making cuts in the Pentagon budget without undermining our basic security. Look for details within the next two weeks.

There are plenty of savings to be had from eliminating unneeded weapons systems and cutting waste, fraud and abuse, but it is important to note that any substantial reduction in Pentagon spending will have to involve reducing U.S. global commitments. We can’t and shouldn’t continue to structure our forces as if they should be able to go anywhere and do anything. This is directly relevant to the new National Security Strategy.

$700 billion year, much of it devoted to weapons for fighting the Cold War which, last I checked, St. Ronnie won for us over 20 years ago. This makes no sense.

Time to turn our swords into plowshares. Instead of spending $485 million to build an engine the Pentagon says it doesn’t want, why can’t these workers be retrained and factories retrofitted to build things this country does want: things that are even more important to our national security than weapons for a war no one is fighting anymore? Things like components for wind turbines and solar panels and parts for electric vehicles and the like?

Why do we keep making the same mistakes over and over again? It boggles the mind.

Budget Fun

Think you’ve got what it takes to cut the U.S. debt? Here’s your chance. It’s the Committee For A Responsible Federal Budget’s on-line simulator.

Not that bogus “you cut” exercise the House GOP is touting, either. That one is hilarious because the only things you’re allowed to cut is stuff the GOP thinks is useless anyway, like the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families Emergency Contingency Fund. As ThinkProgress observed,

eliminating every single one of the proposed YouCut items would amount to cutting 0.017 percent of the federal budget.

This exercise wasn’t nearly as difficult as I expected. I got within 3% of the goal simply by reducing our troop levels in Iraq and Afghanistan to 30,000. Personally, I’d like to reduce our troops levels to zero. I honestly have no clue why we are still in either theater, we aren’t accomplishing squat in my inexpert opinion.

Interestingly, repealing the healthcare reform legislation actually leads to a $160 billion budget increase, while enacting cap-and-trade legislation creates a $330 billion decrease.

Anyway, I reduced the debt to 54% of GDP in 2018, and I kept it at a sustainable level through 2030. Yay me.

It wasn’t all that painful, either. I did it while increasing funds for mass transit and expanding the college tax credit. I should be president, y’all.

Read Libby

I've got nothing for today so please read Libby because she says everything I wanted to.

Utah Republican Drowns School In The Bathtub

Who says Republicans don’t have any ideas:

(NEWSER) – Utah is considering battling its $700 million budget gap, and wiping out senioritis in the bargain, by eliminating the entire last year of high school. GOP state Sen. Chris Buttars' proposal to eliminate 12th grade altogether could save the state up to $60 million. The plan is supported by those who argue students goof off their last year, and that it's not needed for college. But the proposal is facing stiff opposition from parents, teachers and students.

This is your country on Republicanism, people. Read it and weep.

Er, scratch that. Just weep. Because when you shrink government down to where you can drown it in the bathtub, you get rid of stuff like schools, levees, bridge repairs. Figures this boneheaded idea would come from a Republican in the reddest of the red states, Utah.

Naturally Chris Buttars' idea has been highly controversial. Thoroughly pilloried by people who think the richest country in the world should be able to educate its kids for the full 12 years, the Republican legislator has dialed back his proposal, making it one of those classic Republican ideas that simply restate what has always been on the books:

Buttars has since toned down the idea, suggesting instead that senior year become optional for students who complete their required credits early. He estimated the move could save up to $60 million, the Salt Lake Tribune reported.

[...]

But some education officials say they don't think the plan represents a change.

"We've always had an option in place for early graduation," said Debra Roberts, chairwoman of the Utah Board of Education, adding that it was OK to give students the choice to graduate early, but that they shouldn't be pushed to leave.

About 200 students a year take advantage of early graduation, said Brenda Hales, state associate superintendent.

Buttars, who did not respond to calls for comment, has said he would offer incentives to encourage students to graduate early.

Well that’s one way to boost your graduation rate.

But Let’s Talk About Marsh Mice

Ach. Tennessee’s Republican (and Democratic) representatives--with a few notable exceptions--apparently loaded up some recent bills with those loathesome “earmarks,” then voted against the bills, which passed anyway:

Republican Sen. Lamar Alexander sponsored or co-sponsored 40 requests totaling $83.2 million in 2009, by far the most of any member of the Tennessee delegation.

Republican Sen. Bob Corker put his name on 23 projects totaling $60.8 million, followed by Rep. Zach Wamp, R-Chattanooga, with 14 projects valued at $38.6 million. In Middle Tennessee, Rep. John Tanner, D-Union City, won $25.6 million worth of projects; Rep. Lincoln Davis, D-Pall Mall, had $23.1 million; and Rep. Bart Gordon, D-Murfreesboro, had $9.7 million.

More than half the value of the Tennessee projects came from requests sponsored by one or more members who, on final passage, voted against the funding bills containing the projects.

So now they get to take credit for being “fiscally responsible” by voting against the bills, and reap the rewards of the local “pork” they loaded them with. Sweet!

Look, I don’t have anything against earmarks in principle, and I don’t know the specifics of these projects that Alexander, Corker, Wamp, et. al. funded. For all I know, they’re worthwhile investments. I just think it’s a little hypocritical for Republicans and Blue Dog Dems to treat earrmarks as a big negative when liberal Democrats supposedly use them, then use them themselves and hide the evidence. It’s a little wishy washy.

Pocket Book Politics

Back when I was kid I remember seeing this poster everywhere:


The poster I remember was different, though. It was rainbow colored (but then, wasn’t everything when we were kids?) and the font looked like handwriting. In other words, it was a little more hippy-dippy, but the message was the same:

”It will be a great day when our schools get all the money they need and the air force has to hold a bake sale to buy a bomber.”

I have been thinking about this poster a lot lately, what with all the talk about escalating the war in Afghanistan and calls by some Democrats for a war tax. So imagine my surprise when I heard Bill Frist fearmonger about the healthcare bill thusly:

Frist expects the bill will bring a lot more uninsured Tennesseans into TennCare, the state’s Medicaid program. He says TennCare’s roles could swell by 30 percent over the next decade. The extra money for that will have to come from somewhere, and Frist says one likely cut is education.

“And it’s going to fall back in the laps of the governors – Governor Bredesen, but even more importantly the next governor, who is going to have to cut education, who is going to have to cut the police force, in order to pay for these increased expenses.”

Really? You know, I don’t remember Frist or any of his Bush Administration cronies--or, for that matter, any of the tea baggers--worrying about expenses when they crammed the Iraq War down our throats with their lies and deceptions about mushroom clouds and yellow cake uranium.

Nor do I remember any sudden jones for "fiscal responsibility" when we decided to go after the Taliban in Afghanistan. It’s fair to say one reason our government is in its current fiscal mess is due to trillion-dollar wars that were never put on the books but simply passed on to the next generation, while this generation helped themselves to some tax cuts.

Someone decided to throw a little par-tay and have the grandkids pay for it. Sorry kids, no healthcare for you! We're spending your inheritance on war instead. Take it up with Bill Frist, he's one of the former Senate leaders who thought this idea was just peachy.

Now, I’m going to dispute the whole “there will be cuts in education to pay for healthcare” premise anyway, since education is one of those things for which there are federal grants (including Recovery Funds), though I imagine as soon as the Recovery money stops Frist and his cohorts will shout “See! Told ya so!”

Anyway, the idea that we must choose between educating our kids and keeping them healthy is just so much bullshit. How about both? Why do we have to choose? Only a Republican would think it’s one or the other.

Again I ask: how come there is always money for war, never money for things like education and healthcare? One of the things that kills me about our discourse is how the media always couches the debate on healthcare and education as a fiscal argument. They bought the Republican talking point hook, line and sinker.

Our media asks, Can we afford this? I reply: My God, can we afford not to? But on issues of war, "can we afford this" is rarely asked. It's, ohmygawdwe'reallgonnadie. News flash: people are already dying from lack of healthcare in this country. Crazy, ain't it?

Does Bill Frist know how many kids in Tennessee don’t have health insurance? According to FamiliesUSA, it’s one out of every 13 kids (or was--before the economic downturn. It could be worse now). What good is education if kids are too sick to get to school?

How often do we hear war spending presented in fiscal terms like this? Rarely. Yet an additional 40,000 troops in Afghanistan is estimated to cost $40 billion a year. That’s in addition to what we are already spending on the war.

Another $40 billion. That’s $40 billion on top of the hundreds and hundreds of billions we’ve already spent there. We’ve already sank more money into blowing up two countries than we needed to fund healthcare reform and education.

Why is it when it comes to things like healthcare we quibble about the pennies and go to great lengths to make sure a bill is “budget neutral.” Why don’t our wars have to be “budget neutral”?

Why is a war of choice always viewed as a necessity, but necessities like healthcare and education are luxuries?

I’m tired of people like Bill Frist telling us we need to choose between educating our kids and keeping them healthy. That’s just wrong. We just need to shift our priorities.

It will be a great day when the country realizes we can’t afford these little, decades-long military adventures any more. Sorry but we’ve got kids to educate, and a populace to keep healthy, and senior citizens to care for. We have levees to shore up and an energy grid to repair.

If you want your little war, go have a bake sale.

Drowning In The Bathtub

I’m old enough to remember $700 toilet seats at the Pentagon and Reagan-era calls to “cut government waste.” In fact, “cutting government waste” has become such a part of the American lexicon that no budget conversation, from the county dog catcher’s office to the massive federal budget, can take place without hearing the “government waste” mantra repeated ad nauseum.

That’s all very well and good but after nearly 30 years of hearing that canard, and with an economic downturn cutting revenue at all levels of government, we’re seeing the effects of those shorn-to-the-bone government budgets. It’s pouring out there, a deluge, and no one has a rainy day fund.

I won’t even bring up the sorry State of California, where the budget crisis is its own weird brand of wackadoodle. The people keep voting for all sorts of unfunded programs (like a $3 billion bond for stem cell research) while also voting to restrict taxation. Grow up already, people. Sooner or later you’re going to have to start paying for this stuff.

And that’s my message to people here in Tennessee (and everywhere else). After years of “cutting the fat” we’ve started cutting some pretty alarming stuff. On the local level, my 2009 Davidson County property tax statement came with this aviso:

“Due to budget restraints, we will not be mailing a courtesy reminder as we have in the past in the month of February. This will be the only statement you will receive for the 2009 tax year.”

Really? That’s the “fat” we’re trimming from the budget--sending a second property tax bill? This is on top of Metro Public Works cutting their mowing program this summer. And let me say, trying to cross Granny White Pike at Gale Lane has been a dangerous proposition when the grass is knee-high.

Even more alarmingly, Putnam County, TN, is in such dire straights it has considered doing away with county primary elections:

COOKEVILLE, Tenn. -- Putnam County is looking at the prospect of eliminating primary elections in hopes of saving $60,000.

On Monday night, the county commission voted 14 to 9 to ask the county parties to forgo primary elections and select candidates through private caucuses.

Primary elections are historically low-turnout, but nonetheless canceling an election for fiscal reasons sets off alarm bells with me. You tea party folks yammering about your loss of freedoms might want to consider what it means to cancel an election because the county doesn’t have the funds to stage it.

Then again, will our moribund electorate even notice?

It’s only a matter of time before this fiscal starvation starts costing people in other ways. Up in Michigan, the state budget situation is so sorry, they’ve had to stop safety inspections of school buses:

"It's not a good thing, but it's a budget reality," LeBlanc said. "I'm not sure there are viable alternatives."

I guess the free hand of the market is supposed to protect Michigan kids on their way to school from now on.

Could this happen in Tennessee? We’ve already dumped another 84,000 people from TennCare. Now the state legislature says it will permanently slash $1 billion from Tennessee’s state budget. The reason is lower revenue, but the Republican legislature thinks this is a good way to operate state government:

“I really think you need to expect and can treat these $1 billion to $1.1 billion in base reductions ... as permanent,” said Jim White, executive director of the legislature’s Fiscal Review Committee, told House leaders on Thursday. “State government is going to be smaller and different after we complete this budget year.”

Well, that’s a great talking point and it sure looks good in the press release, but how does that look in practice? Not so good, it seems:

After more than two hours of grim assessments Thursday, House Speaker Emeritus Jimmy Naifeh, D-Covington, had enough. He predicted the state’s Rainy Day Fund, once at $750 million and projected to fall to $323 million in 2010-11, “is probably going to go down to zero.”

He called the removal of some TennCare recipients “heartbreaking” and said lawmakers are to blame. He also urged colleagues to look at a tax increase.

“No one has got the backbone or the guts to talk about revenue enhancement,” Rep. Naifeh complained. “That’s what we need to at least explore.”

Nope, no one has the guts or backbone, not the Republicans and not the Democrats. But it’s pretty irresponsible to view your “rainy day fund” as budgetary fat.

People are so disconnected from the services that government provides that no one notices the hypocrisy of fiscal conservatives calling for ballot initiatives over stuff like English Only and do we need a new convention center. You know, that's all very well and good but it costs money to open up the polling places and count all of those votes. Who’s gonna pay for it?

Conventional wisdom holds that tax increases during a recession are a sure way to prolong the misery. Maybe now isn't the time, but eventually we're going to have to repeal those Bush tax cuts which helped no one but the super wealthy. Didn't see any of that trickle down over the past eight years, either.

Yesterday I heard Thom Hartmann advocate a 50% tax on people making $3 million+. Rather than hurt “small businesses,” he said, it would actually grow the middle class because business owners would funnel their profits back into their businesses instead of taking home big salaries to be spent on European vacations and yachts.

Here's a handy-dandy chart of Top U.S. Federal marginal income tax rate from 1913 to 2009:



Our tax rates are among the lowest they've been in the past 100 years. Are people better off? No. Has the "Laffer Curve" fulfilled its promise of increasing revenue? No it has not. Instead we're cutting safety inspections of school buses, using up our rainy day funds, and talking about cancelling elections because governments can't afford them.

It's time for someone to be a grown up and talk about what it means to operate a state budget without a safety net.

Permanent War Economy Electric Boogaloo

Beating swords into plowshares? Saxby Chambliss isn’t a fan:

An effort by Sen. Saxby Chambliss to force the Pentagon into buying more F-22 fighter jets is reviving tensions between the Georgia Republican and a stalwart in his own party, Sen. John McCain (Ariz.).

Chambliss won narrow approval at a closed-door Senate Armed Services Committee markup for his amendment authorizing $1.75 billion to purchase seven F-22 Raptors from Georgia-based Lockheed Martin — despite strong objections from McCain, the ranking Republican on the panel, and a veto threat from President Obama.

This is corporate welfare for the war economy in a nutshell. Sen. Saxby Chambliss is trying to force us to spend $1.75 billion -- that’s with a B folks -- on a program the Pentagon doesn’t even want!

The F-22 is obsolete:

It is a cold war relic, designed for defense against the Soviet Union. It has never flown in combat, much less in the wars this country is actually fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan.

But Republicans and a handful of breakaway Democrats in Congress want to stay on the F-22 gravy train :

During the closed markup, Chambliss got support from three other Democrats and one Independent: Sens. Edward Kennedy (Mass.), Robert Byrd (W.Va.) — both voting by proxy — Mark Begich (Alaska) and Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.).

Lieberman supports it because although Lockheed Martin assembles the F-22 in Marietta, Ga., the engines are built by Pratt & Whitney in Connecticut. I’d guess the other Senators have similar jobs incentives for keeping an obsolete fighter jet the Pentagon doesn’t want in production. After all, that is the point: that is why companies like Lockheed Martin spread their production around the country, to maximize their influence in Congress.

And it’s not just jobs: some in Congress have their personal fortunes at stake, too. For example, Rep. Phil Gingrey of Georgia, a vocal F-22 defender, owns stock in Boeing, Lockheed Martin’s partner in the F-22.

I’ve written about this issue before here. It would be nice if we could cut wasteful Pentagon programs that cost in the billions of dollars and transition that money to job-creating programs in the green energy sector, for example, or healthcare reform.

People need jobs. America needs to manufacture things. Would it be so hard to transition away from manufacturing an obsolete fighter jet to making solar panels and wind turbines? Heck, we transitioned from manufacturing consumer goods to manufacturing for war during World War II.

Of course, it doesn’t work that way anymore.

It’s not like the Pentagon has suddenly become all touchy-feely, we-are-the-worldy, everyone hold hands and sing Kumbaya. They simply wish to cap the F-22 fleet at 187 planes, which should be sufficient. Sec. Gates wants to transition production to the F-35 instead, also made by Lockheed Martin. This isn’t a cut in Pentagon spending at all, it’s just changing to a different kind of fighting weapon. And its controversial because people like Saxby Chambliss want to preserve jobs in their states.

One of these days, maybe a few centuries from now, we’re going to look back on an America that built its economy on war toys at a time when the people needed healthcare and clean energy. And we’re going to wonder what the hell were we thinking?

But for now, the permanent war economy rolls on.

Huzzah.

War Is Over!!!

According to right-wing pundits, that is. For example:

• Charles Krauthammer, Washington Post, April 17, 2009:

The Obama administration is spending money like none other in peacetime history.

• Andrew Biggs, American Enterprise Institute, April 15, 2009:

This new spending, dedicated to healthcare, energy, education, and other areas, is 14 percent above the 19.9 percent average during the Bush years and higher than any peacetime presidential administration in U.S. history.

• Diana Furchtgott-Roth , Hudson Institute, March 26, 2009:

On Tuesday, Mr. Obama said that “this budget is inseparable from recovery, because it lays the foundation for secure and lasting prosperity.” In fact, what it does is lay the foundation for unprecedented levels of peacetime deficits and government spending. That’s not an "investment" that the American people need to make.

• Karl Rove, Feb. 12, 2009:

The bill he signs will create a raft of new programs and be the biggest peacetime spending increase in American history, which will give us larger deficits and create pressure to raise taxes.

• Wall Street Journal Op-Ed, January 8, 2009:

The looming red ink is unlike anything in U.S. peacetime history.

[...]

Yet somehow none of those same voices are objecting now that the government is spending its way into deficits that are so large they dwarf any during peacetime in U.S. history.

Want more? There’s lots.

Funny that a bunch of conservative hawks who were so anxious to drag this nation into war six years ago, then pilloried Democrats for not sufficiently supporting the troops at every politically convenient turn, are now so quick to forget that America is still engaged in not one but TWO wars.

Hello?

It's also uncanny how the word “peacetime” shows up in relation to any discussion of the Obama budget .... almost as if these right-wing pundits were working off the same crib-sheet. Gee, ya think? My money says this came straight off the Republican leadership’s desk.

Here’s a thought for the conservative thinkers out there. We could save more than $10 billion a month if we pulled put of Iraq and Afghanistan now. Let’s call their bluff on this, shall we? A week and a half ago Obama requested $83.4 billion more for the wars, which is supposed to last us another eight months. If you're so hot for fiscal belt-tightening, well, I think I just found a big pile of money that we could save.

President Bush never put his war spending in the budget. He hid it under the peanut shell called “emergency supplemental appropriations.” Again, this is another dishonest right-wing ploy designed to reinforce the stereotype that Democrats are “big spenders” whereas Republicans are supposedly fiscally responsible. Hilarious.

Reality is a lot different, of course, but in the world of manufactured Republican talking points, the only “truth” that matters is what sticks in the American subconscious. And that's why we keep seeing the word "peacetime" thrown about in relation to the Obama budget, as if we still didn't have a couple hundred thousand troops deployed overseas. As if we're comparing Obama's budget to, you know, Reagan's. It's the height of dishonesty.

You guys really think this is going to work? You think we're that stupid?

Permanent War Economy Redux

I just came from a coffee with Congressman Jim Cooper and a few other bloggers--the first of many, I’m told, so if you’re a Nashville blogger who didn’t get word of this meeting, don’t feel left out, as there will be others.

Our conversation hopscotched around a variety of topics, but one issue of interest to me was Defense Secretary Gates’ plan to halt production of the F-22 in late 2011. It’s a decision Cooper supports--I liked his statement earlier this week that "we no longer have the luxury of running the Defense Department as a hometown jobs program”--but it’s significant that Cooper and Sen. John McCain were the only members of Congress to signal support for the plan.

It of course all comes down to politics, and Cooper told us that of the 60 people on the Armed Services Committee, “I may be the only one who doesn’t have a major defense contractor or base in their district.” It’s why Lockheed Martin's F-22 is assembled from parts made in 44 states, he noted; that's not a manufacturing necessity, but a political one. It spreads their sphere of influence over a broad swath of congressional districts.

What’s alarming is that our snooze media has done its usual half-assed job of reporting on the proposed Pentagon budget, framing it as a budget cut when it is in fact a budget increase. And while lots of attention has been given to the phase-out of the F-22, not too much attention has been given to the part of Gates’ budget which calls for accelerating production of the F-35.

Republican Senators Chambliss and Isakson have vowed to keep F-22 production going, and they will make an economic argument, which I find morally reprehensible:

His tactic likely will be to target union-state Democrats and convince them that the F-22 is a "shovel-ready" jobs program and a necessary deterrent.

Excuse me, but if you base your economy on building weapons, then aren’t you also basing your economy on war? Aren’t you pretty much guaranteeing more unnecessary debacles like Iraq? What are we building all of these weapons for, if not to use them? If they're just for "show," as a "deterrent," then how many of these damn things do we need?

It’s a popular saying these days that America no longer manufactures anything; I’ve probably said it myself. But it’s not true. We make weapons. Lots of ’em.

Isn’t this the “permanent war economy” we’ve all said we don’t want?

Over in Fort Worth, Texas, Lockheed Martin expects to do very nicely under Gates’ proposed budget, the F-22 notwithstanding:

Even with no additional F-22 work, Lockheed Aeronautics, which is based in Fort Worth, should "be a $20 billion company within five years," Stevenson said. It was worth $11.5 billion last year.

Wall Street analysts were nearly unanimous in the view that Lockheed should fare well under Gates’ plan.

Gee, that’s nice. Too bad about that ethanol plant that just declared bankruptcy, though. Ditto these biofuels producers that also declared bankruptcy in recent weeks.

I’m trying to remember the last time a defense contractor went bankrupt.

It’s certainly disappointing to me that our best argument supporting the phase-out of an expensive and obsolete fighter jet is that “we’re still increasing the Pentagon’s budget, so quit yer whining!” Why is there never a conversation about slashing the size of our military, period? And by the way: Why are we still spending $10 billion a month on Iraq?

I can certainly foresee a future in which political pressure on "union-state Democrats" wins out, and we keep manufacturing the F-22 so Georgia doesn’t lose any jobs while at the same time boosting production of the F-35 for the people in Texas. And this is how we grow our military and maintain the power and influence of the military industrial complex. The permanent war economy is here and it's, well, permanent.

I don't have any answers but I sure do have some questions. Rep. Cooper told us he's the ranking Democrat on a panel looking into reform of the defense contracting process. I eagerly anticipate hearing what this panel has to say. Because right now, the defense contractors have far too big an interest in making sure we're building more and bigger weapons, which means they have an interest in making sure we are always under threat. It's now part of our "economic stimulus." People forget we were attacked on Sept. 11 by some individuals armed with no more than boxcutters. All of the fighter jets in the world wouldn't have prevented that.

With that in mind, for those who missed Jon Stewart's smackdown on the media misinformation surrounding the Defense budget, enjoy:

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	M - Th 11p / 10c
Full Metal Budget
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